1

Every year after 1930, Congress-minded Indians celebrated _________ as Independence Day. However, when the British finally left the subcontinent, they chose to hand over power on _________. This date was selected by Lord Mountbatten as it was the second anniversary of the Japanese surrender to the Allied Forces in the Second World War. He and the politicians waiting to take office were unwilling to delay until the date some others would have preferred - ___________.Fill in the blanks.

• 26th January• 25th August, 1947• 26th January, 1948

2

During the first general elections, Sukumar Sen, the CEC, got outraged by a social practice and directed his officials to correct the electoral rolls by inserting the names of the women ‘in the place of mere descriptions of such voters’. Nonetheless, some 2.8 million women voters had finally to be struck off the list. He felt that such a step will help in eradicating such social practice.What made him take such drastic step?

• The social practice of women referring themselves as someone’s wife, daughter, mother,etc.• These women had written their names with reference to a certain

male member of the family like Babloo’s wife.

3

This system was introduced during British days keeping in mind the early sunrise in North-East part of the country.By and large, the system has been successful in increasing the productivity of tea garden workers as they save on daylight by finishing the work during daytime. Working time for tea labourers in the gardens is generally between 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. It may vary slightly from garden to garden.

Which system?

• The tea gardens in Assam do not follow the Indian Standard Time but follow the Tea Garden Time of BaganTime.

4

Which organization owns this social networking site?

5

We often come across these sign posts across the railway tracks in India. What do they mean?

• The 'W' is a general whistle indicator while the 'W/L' stands for Whistle for Level Crossing. The latter is also seen in Hindi with the characters 'see/pha' == 'seetee bajao - phatak'). Usually provided on approach to unmanned level crossings (and for manned level crossings without a clear view) about 250m away from the level crossing. Similarly, a 'W/B' sign is seen (less often) on approach to a bridge.

6

Name this font.

• Gandhi Font created by the advertising agency Leo Burnett.

7

__________is located to the east of Gwalior Fort. Built in 1092 by King Mahipala of the Kachchhapaghata (Kachchhwaha) dynasty, this temple is one of the greatest architectural marvels situated by Gwalior Fort. It was named __________, depicting a man with a thousand hands or Lord Vishnu. Lord Vishnu was worshiped by the wife of the Kachchhapaghata's king, but when his son's wife came, she became a devotee of Lord Shiva. Thus, another temple beside Vishnu temple was built, where Lord Shiva was worshiped by the wife of the king's son. Collectively, these two temples are known by what name?

• Saas-Bahu Temple

8

Identify the guy sitting on the top of this taxi.

Richard Branson

9

This first appeared under the name “matrameru” in the Sanskrit scholar Pingala. It got wide range popularity after its appearance in The Da Vinci Code.What?

• Fibonacci Series

10

When asked about what they do during the deliveries.

“Me and _______ talk about kids, house construction, plumbers, electricians, running errands. You cannot keep talking cricket the whole day.”

Identify the two.

• Rahul Dravid and VVS Laxman.

11

_______ follows its own financial accountability principle. There is no credit method for running operations in the organization. Every payment is done on a daily basis, except for the outside supply of raw material. Profits and losses are shared equally among the members of a given branch. In the initial days of _____, the profits of the first six months were shared equally among all members in the form of gold. This sharing practice is still in effect, but now the decision whether to share the profits in gold or in cash is made at the branch level.

Which organization?

• Lijjat Mahila Grihudyog

12

By what name is the in-house ad agency of Dabur known as?

• Adbur, an anagram of the word Dabur.

13

X had been fond of using voice-overs to establish themes. Nikaah, which dealt with the laws of divorce in Muslim society, began with the image of a nude woman taking up the centre of the screen, before a female voice began an extended commentary on the many roles of a woman. The opening words were: “_______”.The narrator in X’s Bahadur Shah Zafar, a personification of Delhi’s Red Fort, was introduced itself in a familiar manner as “_____”.When it came to decide upon the opening lines for this famous work of his, X again followed the same formula and went with with “________”. What was it?

• Main Aaurat Hoon.• Main Lal-Quila Hoon.• And the final one is the epic “Main Samay Hoon”, the opening lines of

B R Chopra’s Mahabharata.

14

About Us page of this brand has the following lines:We, the makers of _____ are called Hector Beverages. And Hector Beverages is a foolish idea.Here's what the outsider would see: a new entrant, in an unproven space, out to take on giants with the deepest of pockets (any guesses on what Coke pays Amir Khan, or Pepsi gives to MSD?, or how much does Red Bull's Formula 1 team cost?) And the company goes on and calls itself Hector, who lost to Achilles. But that, people, is the trip: the audacity of the underdog. We decided to take the big guys on We decided to not be cowed down by the big bullies who make their fortune selling sweetened, fizzy water. And we know that Achilles does not have the most powerful heels. FITB.

15

Back in the 1960s, a big Hollywood casting director called Harvey Wood came and selected me for a ____'s role. Although I had done many films before as hero and villain, I don't know why I found popularity only as ______. I got a lot of acting assignments, but all as ______. Twenty years later, I bumped into Harvey Wood again. He looked at me and said, "Bloody hell! You're still in the same uniform." He asked me to mail him the details of all my films as I was onto a world record for the most occupational role. Later the Guinness book people sent a team to Bombay to verify facts before they entered my name in their book.

FITB and identify the guy.

• Jagdish Raj as a cop.

16

He complained about it to his wife Emily early on: “I am having difficulty with Baker. You remember the perspective showing the secretariats with Government House beyond. Well, he has designed his levels so that you will never see Government House at all (!) from the Great Place. You will see the top of the dome!”.

Which buildings are being referred here.

• Edwin Luytens complaining about Rashtrapati Bhawan and the North Block & South Block.

17

• At the age of one, his family immigrated to Bombay and started living in the slums there. He enrolled in school and later graduated from Ismail Yusuf College. Between 1970 and 1975, he taught at M. H. Saboo Siddik College of Engineering in Byculla as professor of civil engineering.• On the college's annual day function, Khan took part in a play and it was

acclaimed by all present. Dilip Kumar came to know about it; he called him and showed keenness in watching the play. Khan made special arrangements and acted the play for him. Kumar was so impressed that he signed him for his next two films: Sagina Mahato and Bairaag.• He is hardly known for being the man behind most of Amitabh Bachchan’s

famous dialogues.• Name this Khan?

18

The general ideas on the creation of the seal for this organisation were as follows:• the seal should emphasize the Governmental status, but not too closely; • it should have something Indian in the design; • it should be simple, artistic and heraldically correct; and • the design should be such that it could be used without substantial alteration for

letter heading, etc. For this purpose, various seals, medals and coins were examined. The East India Company Double Mohur, with the sketch of the Lion and Palm Tree, was found most suitable; however, it was decided to replace the lion by the tiger, the latter being regarded as the more characteristic animal of India!Identify the seal.

19

Denmark ruled over the X from 1756 to 1868 naming them 'Frederick _____' after a Danish King. In 1847, Denmark had offered to transfer this piece of land to Great Britain for a consideration of 50,000 pounds but the offer was rejected by the British. However, in 1868 the King of Denmark handed over this piece of land to Great Britain free of cost.

Name this piece of land.

• Nicobar Islands.

20

In 1930, India was swept over by Gandhi’s Satyagraha which had an effect on football. Indian clubs boycotted the ongoing Calcutta Football League midway through the season due to this. Amidst much confusion, Royal Regiment was declared winners in the first division. However, X, in spite of being well ahead in the second division, was not allowed to be promoted to the First Division. They suspected Y’s hand behind the league boycott to thwart X’s promotion to the First Division. Thousands of X fans and officials decided to hold a protest march. It was at this march that flaming torches were carried by the protestors. This gave the club officials the idea of a torch being the club emblem, which has stuck to this day.Identify X & Y.

• East Bengal & Mohan Bagan

21

As per the wishes of the song writer, Saregama(HMV) is required to contribute a certain amount to the Army Welfare Fund for the disabled and war widows from the royalty proceeds of sale of records of the song X.Identify the song X.

• Aye Mere Watan Ke Logon.

22

When the sepoys stormed into Delhi during the Mutiny of 1857, they remained strangers with different dialects, accents and customs. Delhi people referred them as X or Purbias – effectively outsiders. X is a reference to Y in modern Andhra Pradesh, where the British originally recruited many of their sepoys during the Carnatic Wars of the eighteenth century. In Delhi the name seems to have stuck as an appellation for British trained troops, although they had stopped recruiting from that area. Identify X and Y.

• Tilangas and Telengana

23

The programme was introduced in a large scale in 1960s under the Chief Ministership of Kamaraj. However, the first major thrust came in 1982 when the then Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, Dr. M. G. Ramachandran, decided to universalise the scheme for all children in government schools.Although the programme in Tamil Nadu was initially termed as an act of "populism", the success of the scheme made the project hugely popular. The success was so spectacular that in 1995, the then Indian Finance minister Manmohan Singh hailed the success of the project and suggested that the scheme be implemented all over the country.

Name this scheme.

• Mid-day Meal Scheme

24

The ingredients for this recipe are chicken, spices and the specialty is the choice of rice named Khyma. Khaima rice is generally mixed with ghee. Although huge amount of spices such as mace, cashew nuts, sultana raisins, fennel-cumin seeds, tomato, onion, ginger, garlic, shallot, cloves and cinnamon e.t.c are used, there is only a small amount of chilli (or chilli powder) used in the preparation.It uses the dum method of preparation, i.e. sealing the lid with dough(maida) or loin cloth and placing red hot charcoal above the lid.Name the recipe.

• Thalaserry or Kozhikode Biryani.

25

Apart from its primary use, Indians use this product also for things like:• The ____ in X comes in handy for giving a smooth finish and shine to

Benaras silk saris.• For waterproofing, X are cut and spread under the cement-concrete

mortar above ceilings.• For roads, large quantities of X are mixed with tar-concrete in hot-mix

plants to churn out a high quality road finish product.

Identify X.

• Condoms(Deluxe Nirodh)

26

The word _______ comes from the Persian word, _____, which means “low” (neech) and is equivalent to calling someone “low-caste”. So the next time, you feel all smug about Indians leaving caste behind, just listen around. This “innocuous” gaali shows just how embedded caste is, even in upper-class Indian society.

• Kameena

27

Fill in the blanks.